Humanity is at a crossroads
…It's time to change
Human civilization has come to that edge,
behind which modern technology
they will no longer be able to ensure progressVladimir Kryuchkov, "Results" No. 52-2012
Many scientists consider the XXI century a kind of turning point in the history of human civilization. Existing technologies, according to some, are not only unable to solve all the accumulated problems, but on the contrary, they aggravate them. The famous British futurist and recognized guru of the information technology age, Dr. James Martin, argues that this century may be the last for human civilization if people do not make a scientific and technological breakthrough on a planetary scale. The same opinion is shared by most experts in the field of innovation and development of science. So, according to the co–chairman of the Institute of World Ideas Alexander Chikunov, who has spent the last two years studying numerous forecasts for several decades ahead, the next 50-60 years of our history will provide humanity with two opportunities - either an extraordinary flourishing, which has never happened before, or a gradual decline.
Not enough for everyoneExperts see the main danger in the way that humanity embarked on at the turn of the XIX – XX centuries.
Namely, in the technologies that originated in those years and provide our life now. They can no longer be replicated to the number of earthlings that is expected by the middle of the century. According to scientists, the technologies currently used allegedly lead to the depletion of resources, depriving people of water, food and energy, which will lead to a rollback to "dark times". For example, today the world's population consumes about 160 billion tons of water per year. "If you load all of it into railway tanks, you will need a 300,000–mile-long train that will circumnavigate the Earth 37 times," says the futurist. Nature does not have time to recover, and the main sources of fresh water – rivers – are rapidly decreasing in volume. This leads to the fact that the fertile soil in their floodplains becomes unsuitable for agriculture. James Martin estimated that 100 million hectares of arable land are lost annually due to irrational use and 15 million hectares of new deserts appear.
The problem is complicated by the fact that in the next 40 years, according to forecasts, the world's population will grow from 7 to 9-10 billion people. To feed them, until 2050, a grain harvest equal to that collected over the past 8-10 millennia will be required. In recent years, scientists and politicians have been seriously discussing whether it is even possible to feed 9 billion people.
The problems of humanity are not limited to the shortage of food and water. According to Alexander Chikunov, electricity consumption is expected to double at least in the next 40 years. At the same time, the main burden will fall on the existing energy carriers – oil, gas and coal. A few years ago, Bill Gates, after conducting an independent analysis, announced: humanity does not know how to replace the hydrocarbons on which the energy industry has lived for many years, and we need an "energy miracle". To find it, there are about 20 years.
With the reproduction of resources that are basic for humanity, something needs to be solved. The only question is which way to move.
Ways of developmentTo avoid the collapse of civilization, according to Alexander Chikunov, it is possible to "reinvent" basic technologies.
For this, in his opinion, "20 bright heads are urgently needed – such as Tesla and Edison." The calculation is based on the fact that the technologies currently used were invented in a fairly short period of time, and with only fifty innovators. But first we need to decide: what new technologies should bring to rid the world of future problems and respond to future challenges? And here the opinions of practicing scientists differ greatly from the opinions of those who see a panacea only in new breakthroughs. For breakthroughs have already happened. Take, for example, the same food products. Experts are sure that in solving this problem, humanity has long embarked on a new path, from which it is unlikely to turn off. With the increasing shortage of fertile land and the steady growth of the population, the question of changing the properties of plants and their yields already seems inevitable. This is the same genetic engineering around which so many copies are broken. And here the choice is very difficult, because we are talking about the survival of humanity. Nevertheless, geneticists claim that people have been on the rails of genetic modification of plants and animals since they began to engage in agriculture and cattle breeding. Only now problems with changing the properties of food products are solved not by crossing species for a long time and checking the correctness of the choice in practice, but in scientific laboratories at the molecular level.
"A person will be able to modernize existing technologies for a long time, gradually introducing fundamentally new ones," says Sergey Dmitruk, Technical Director of 3M Russia, Candidate of Chemical Sciences. – For example, the crisis in the production and consumption of energy resources can at least be delayed with the help of new developments. Among them are technologies to reduce losses in the transmission of energy, its consumption and production. The simplest example is the transition to energy–saving light bulbs all over the world. In addition, modern technologies allow us to develop the bowels of the earth, all the same hydrocarbons, much more efficiently than before. So, in the Gulf of Mexico, American oilmen with the help of special solutions have achieved an increase in the production of pure oil by 20 times from the same reservoir."
"Today, literally every day, they report about discoveries, new inventions, achievements that are received in laboratories around the world – in Japan, China, America, England," adds Vladimir Arshinov, Doctor of Philosophy, Head of the sector of interdisciplinary problems of Scientific and Technical Development of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences. – There is a rapid mutually reinforcing process, and it has a chain character. At the same time, we are really talking about the restructuring of the world order, on which the entire human civilization has been based for the last two thousand years."
It's no secret that today there are technologies that will be able to literally change life on Earth in the near future. For example, reducing the cost of genome decoding will eventually lead to a radical change in the healthcare sector. "Everyone will choose their own medicines without consulting a doctor, and, after consulting with a powerful knowledge base, make them at home on a 3D printer," says Professor Alexander Sokolov, director of the HSE Foresight Center. It is quite possible that in the next 30-40 years humanity will come closer to solving the riddle of immortality, because even today experimental mice live three times longer than their ordinary counterparts. "Smart" bacteria with synthetic neurons, united in a kind of colonies, will significantly surpass the human brain in characteristics, which, in turn, will be connected to machines and huge arrays of knowledge, as a result of which people will be able to exchange thoughts instead of words. "A lot of this seems fantastic, but sooner or later everything that does not contradict the laws of physics will be realized," the expert is sure.
Be human!Together with the replacement of old technologies with new ones, a person will be forced not only to change nature, adjusting it to himself.
He will have to change himself. But just how far will these changes go? Today, it seems to many that the movement towards transhumanism – the fusion of a person with a computer – is inevitable. Transhumanists say that biological civilization will move into a new quality. However, this qualitative leap may simply mean the disappearance of humanity as such, because the uncontrolled development of technology itself will change human civilization so much that the human principle itself will be under the control of unlimited technological development.
The new stage of technological development, like all the previous ones, carries great threats for humanity, but at the same time great hopes. Humanity cannot do without new developments. The main thing is that as a result, a person does not become a secondary being on Earth. Although, on the other hand, a creature with a robot body and soul is unlikely to worry about the problems of food, water and ecology.
Inhuman feelings According to the forecasts of IBM Corporation for the next 5 years, computers of the future will be able to simulate the five main human senses.
The sense of touch. Buying clothes or other goods in the online store, the customer will be able to "touch" them. Innovation will be possible thanks to the phone's sensitivity technology. Tactile sensations from any object will transmit unique vibrations of a cell phone.
Vision. Computers understand the meaning of an image only by text tags and name. The content of the image is still a mystery to them. But soon they will not only learn to recognize what is depicted in a photo or picture, but also understand the meaning of the image as well as you and me. Computers will be able to analyze various characteristics: the color of an object or a pattern on its surface, tangible boundaries – in general, to gain knowledge from visual data.
Hearing. A distributed network of sensors will be presented to determine sound pressure and vibrations, as well as to distinguish sound waves at different frequencies. The computer will be able to interpret the sounds to calculate the risks of falling trees in the forest or an avalanche in the mountains. Such a system will "listen" to the world around us and warn us about potential danger.
Taste. A new computer system capable of truly experiencing taste sensations will be able to "split" ingredients to their molecular level and make unique chemical compositions of food compounds taking into account people's taste and aromatic preferences. An indispensable gadget for chefs!
Sense of smell. Tiny sensors built into a computer or mobile phone will be able to analyze odors, biomarkers and thousands of molecules in a person's breath and correlate them with the norm, help doctors diagnose and monitor colds, liver and kidney disorders, asthma, diabetes, epilepsy.
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru24.12.2012